Digg Sold To LinkedIn AND The Washington Post And Betaworks

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Sun Valley and self-driving cars aside, the story of the day today is that social news site Digg has sold its remaining assets for $500K to the NYC-based tech firm Betaworks. While that number is indeed in the ballpark, we’re hearing from multiple sources that the total price of the Digg acquisition was around $16 million, including the price paid for IP by a previously unreported acquirer, LinkedIn.

According to a familiar source, the Washington Post ended up paying $12 million for the Digg team. Around the same time, career social network LinkedIn paid between $3.75 million and $4 million for around 15 different Digg patents including the patent on “click a button to vote up a story”.

Betaworks picked up all the remaining assets today, including the domain, code, data and all the traffic for between $500k and $725k. We’re hearing that Borthwick and co. will license from LinkedIn whatever patents it needs to execute on what it chooses to do with those assets. I have no word on how the “single-digit millions equity deal” some are reporting fits in here exactly.

Pre-acquisition, social news vanguard Digg had raised $45 million in funding from Greylock Partners,Marc Andreessen, LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman and other Valley notables. Digg was an extremely influential site for anyone who worked in the early era of online publishing, so it being scrapped for parts is sort of weird, especially for those of us who used to beg friends to vote up Digg stories.

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CrunchBase

OverviewDigg Inc. operates a website that enables its users to find, read, and share the most interesting and talked about stories on the internet. It is an editorially driven front page, aiming to select stories related to science, politics, and viral internet issues.
It also enables users to find stories on their iOS or Android devices through its mobile apps; and delivers stories via daily emails.
Digg …

OverviewLinkedIn is a professional networking site that allows its members to create business connections, search for jobs, and find potential clients.
The site also enables its users to build and engage with their professional networks; access shared knowledge and insights; and find business opportunities. It offers LinkedIn mobile applications across various platforms and languages such as iOS, Android, …